This invention was made in the course of, or under a contract with the United States Atomic Energy Commission.
It is advantageous to irradiate a target with laser light to produce a high temperature plasma. As contemplated by the "blascon" concept and as described by Dawson, J. M., in Phys. Fluids 7, 981 (1964); Lubin, M. J. in Bull. Am. Phys. Soc., 13, 1552 (1968); and in the Proceedings of the Third Conference on Plasma Physics and Controlled Fusion Research, Novosibirsk, 1968, and/or by Linhart, J. G., in Nuclear Fusion 10, 211 (1970), which are incorporated by reference herein, such plasmas can be used for thermonuclear research and/or power production.
It is an object of this invention, therefore, to produce laser-target irradiation with a single laser light source;
It is another object to provide improved means for irradiating and controlling the irradiation of a target with a laser light beam from a single laser source;
It is still another object to produce a plasma of thermonuclear interest by the use of laser light for irradiating a target;
It is also an object to produce a laser-pellet micro-explosion;
It is still a further object to protect a laser light source from the reaction products produced by interacting laser light with a target.